1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed in general to communications systems and methods for operating same, and more particularly to communication of PDP context activation rejection cause codes and Configure-Request Error Codes to a UICC.
2. Description of the Related Art
In known wireless telecommunications systems, transmission equipment in a base station or access device transmits signals throughout a geographical region known as a cell. As technology has evolved, more advanced equipment has been introduced that can provide services that were not possible previously. This advanced equipment might include, for example, an E-UTRAN (evolved universal terrestrial radio access network) node B (eNB), a base station or other systems and devices. Such advanced or next generation equipment is often referred to as long-term evolution (LTE) equipment, and a packet-based network that uses such equipment is often referred to as an evolved packet system (EPS). Another example of advanced equipment includes evolved High Rate Packet Data (eHRPD) type equipment such as that which conforms to the 3GPP2 X.s0057 v3.0 specification. An access device is any component, such as a traditional base station or an LTE eNB (Evolved Node B), that can provide a user agent (UA), such as user equipment (UE) or mobile equipment (ME), with access to other components in a telecommunications system.
In mobile communication systems such as an E-UTRAN, the access device provides radio accesses to one or more UAs. The access device comprises a packet scheduler for allocating uplink (UL) and downlink (DL) data transmission resources among all the UAs communicating to the access device. The functions of the scheduler include, among others, dividing the available air interface capacity between the UAs, deciding the resources (e.g. sub-carrier frequencies and timing) to be used for each UA's packet data transmission, and monitoring packet allocation and system load. The scheduler allocates physical layer resources for physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) and physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) data transmissions, and sends scheduling information to the UAs through a control channel. The UAs refer to the scheduling information for the timing, frequency, data block size, modulation and coding of uplink and downlink transmissions.
In certain mobile communication systems, there is a requirement for a universal integrated circuit card (UICC) application (e.g., a subscriber identity module (SIM), an Internet Protocol (IP) multimedia subsystem (IMS) SIM (ISIM), and a universal terrestrial radio access network (UTRAN) SIM (USIM)) a removable user identity module (RUIM) or a code division multiple access (CDMA) subscriber identity module (CSIM).
In certain known mobile communication systems, the UICC can use USIM Application Toolkit (USAT) commands (e.g., Open/Close Channel commands) to trigger a Packet Data Network (PDN) Connectivity request or an activate packet data protocol (PDP) Context request on the ME. Use of these commands enables the UICC to send IP data to the network on an access point name (APN) of its choosing. This end-to-end IP data session establishment can be used for features like bearer independent protocol (BIP) which provides the UICC with an IP interface to perform over-the-air updates. This interface is more efficient than, e.g., a short message service (SMS) over the air (OTA) mechanism and also allows for larger updates. FIG. 1, labeled Prior Art, shows an example of a UICC interaction with a network when performing USAT commands.
In certain known mobile communication systems, the UICC can use CDMA Card Application Toolkit (CCAT) commands (e.g., Open/Close Channel commands) to trigger a 3GPP2 VSNCP Configure-Request on the ME. Use of these commands enables the UICC to send IP data to the network on an access point name (APN) of its choosing. This end-to-end IP data session establishment can be used for features like bearer independent protocol (BIP) which provides the UICC with an IP interface to perform over-the-air updates. This interface is more efficient than, e.g., a short message service (SMS) over the air (OTA) mechanism and also allows for larger updates.
With the arrival of Machine to Machine M2M, or Machine type communication (MTC) there is speculation that processing functionality for the M2M device will reside inside the UICC and therefore it is likely that the UICC will require more input about its interactions from the network.
An issue which relates to Open and Close channel is that the UICC is not aware of the network failures that may occur during the PDP Context activation procedure (see e.g., 3GPP TS 24.008) or during a PDN Connectivity procedure (see e.g., 3GPP TS 24.301). In some systems, poorly implemented UICC applications could attempt PDP Context or PDN Connectivity retries that result in a negative impact to the network. For example, some event occurs that triggers all the cards deployed on the network to request a data session for an OTA update. The PDP context or PDN Connectivity may be rejected based on lack of capacity. If this condition occurs, the UICC application should back-off its retry attempts to allow the system to recover from this sudden rise in data activity. FIG. 2, labeled Prior Art, shows an example of a UICC retrying a PDP context activation procedure or PDN Connectivity procedure that may impact the network.